


Particularly Pathetic Fallacy

by sellertape



Category: Vampire Diaries (TV)
Genre: F/M, Klaroline, Klaus/Caroline, Missing Scene
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-06
Updated: 2012-06-06
Packaged: 2017-11-07 02:41:05
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,566
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/425991
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sellertape/pseuds/sellertape
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He hadn't made many friends in Mystic Falls, but there was one person he had to say goodbye to. Missing scene from 3x21.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Particularly Pathetic Fallacy

**Author's Note:**

> If we're talking on the grand scale of things, I blame tumblr for this ship of the damned.  
> If we're talking on the small scale of things... Alisha, this is all on you.
> 
> Thrown together in something of a rush, so apologies.

The day had become overcast. Caroline watched the clouds in her mirror, her eyes wandering from the scars across her lips to the bruising of the sky. At this rate they wouldn’t notice the sun going down. The day was dark enough already.

She raised a hand to bite at her thumbnail, a habit she had thought she kicked ten years ago, but as soon as she made contact she withdrew her hand, hissing. Vervain gags were not fun.

He had known that, she sensed. When his hand had clamped across her mouth it was gone almost before she felt the sting, certainly before the impulse to scream had left her. But there was only one person with a voice like his, and the cry had died in her throat as he purred in her ear.

_He didn’t purr, Caroline, he’s not a kitten,_ The Voice of Reason – which usually coupled as The Voice of Liz – snapped. He hissed. He’s a snake, a rat, a spider, anything but a fuzzy doe-eyed-

Says the girl dating a wolf.

_Knock knock_.

Perfect timing. With any luck, that would be Elena, or at least someone to say she was alright. With the worst, it was Alaric, freed from the school by the dense cover of purple clouds. Caroline took the stairs two at a time, steeling herself at the door. Alaric had never been invited in. She was as safe as she could be here.

It wasn’t Alaric. It wasn’t Elena. It wasn’t even Damon.

Klaus leant on the doorframe as though he had personal ownership of her porch, hands jammed into the pockets of a dark jacket. She noticed him giving her a quick once over and before she could stop herself she did the same. He seemed unhurt.

_I don’t care_ , The Voice of Liz countered.

“What do you want?” she asked, not unkindly, breaking the silence more to stop the internal argument she felt brewing. Klaus shrugged.

“I was merely seeing you got home safe.”

“Yeah well, I did, so... thanks.” You came, you saw, now go before–

“I was also wondering if I could talk to you.” –anything like that is said. Caroline exhaled slightly, closing her eyes and noticing just how tired she was.

“What is it?”

“Perhaps we could talk outside?” he spread his arms and her eyes found what the deep pockets had been hiding. Klaus’ hands were covered in blood. He must have noticed her attention shift but offered no explanation. Whose was that? Alaric’s? Elena’s? Klaus’ own?

“Why can’t we do it here?” she murmured, following his movements as the bloody hands returned to their pockets. He looked like a child when he smiled.

“I just helped save your life, love. Humour me.”

Quite when she made the decision to do so she didn’t know, but Caroline found herself falling into step with him, down the porch steps and across the lawn towards the edge of the trees.

“I’m leaving,” Klaus began. He spoke as though he expected her to gasp, or cry, or swoon into his arms, the ancient tool. But Caroline had never been great at doing what other people wanted.

“You’ve said that before,” she commented dryly. Walking beside him, she felt him fall out of step for a second, and was suddenly aware he could snap her spine at any moment. He was back next to her before she could turn, however, and if he had reached for her neck he had changed his mind just as quickly.

“Yes, well, this time I won’t be waiting in the wings. I’m getting the hell off this godforsaken continent with its witches and hunters and whatever else this universe feels good enough to throw at me.” His voice had descended into something of a growl towards the end, but Caroline imagined she heard something else there. It was almost as though he were... tired.

He had left the revelation hanging; she got the impression it was her turn to speak, but could think of nothing to add to it. He clearly wasn’t looking for a reason to stay. They had stopped walking at the edge of the trees and Klaus backed into the nearest, leaning heavily and watching her watch him.

“The offer I made at my family’s ball still stands,” he elaborated suddenly. “I want you to come with me.”

“Drop everything and run with the man who’s terrorised my best friends for the better part of a year?” Caroline folded her arms. Klaus’ lips twisted again and she found her temper flaring. “Why are you smiling?”

Almost as though he had been caught at something bad, the grin was gone. His eyes hit the ground and, God, where was the charming calm vampire she loved to hate? Caroline raised an eyebrow as Klaus rubbed the back of his neck, smearing red across his skin and hair in the most human gesture she’d ever seen of him.

“It’s just... funny,” he stated, without a trace of humour in his voice. “You still call me a man. Most people-”

Most people wouldn’t even put him on par with humanity. Crap.

No, the sympathy card was not going to be played today. Not by Alaric and certainly not by Klaus.

“Well you do have it in you to be pretty monstrous,” she said quietly, refusing to meet his eye as he glanced up.

“Then teach me,” he insisted, pushing himself from the tree trunk and placing himself right in front of her, where she couldn’t avoid looking at him. “Keep me human. Be my anchor. I know you can do it.”

“Why should I?” she snapped. “Why is it down to me? You don’t want that, you never wanted that.”

“I want you.”

His hand found her wrist, slick with blood that trickled down her hand and through her fingers. It should have made her shudder. She didn’t move.

Klaus searched her face for a moment, then chuckled. He reached up with his other hand and gently ran his thumb across the scar on her cheek. She could feel the red print there too.

A peel of thunder made them both glance up. The sky was almost black, a storm hanging low in the air. Unconsciously echoing a human gesture, Caroline pulled her arm out of his grip to fold them against her chest.

“Why won’t it rain?” she whispered.

“You know what witches are like,” Klaus said softly, his eyes roving the sky, as though expecting one of the spirits to flit from the clouds. “Perhaps they’re waiting for something.” Then his eyes returned to hers.

“You won’t come,” he said simply. It wasn’t a question, but she felt she should answer all the same. She shook her head, and thunder rolled again.

The vampire in front of her smiled slightly. “They didn’t like that.”

“Shut up,” she scoffed. “Like they care.”

He nodded slightly, seeming to think, then drew himself up.

“So this is goodbye.”

He leant close and she couldn’t help it, not even after owing him her life twice over. Every muscle in her body tensed. Fight or flight wasn’t even a debate. She was ready to run.

She felt him feel it. He hesitated, and she may have imagined a small sigh of disappointment. There was a moment they seemed to hang there, she like a coiled spring, his breath next to her ear. There couldn’t be more than an inch between them. If she turned her head-

The moment passed. The world moved again. Klaus closed the gap and kissed her lightly on the cheek before drawing back, not quite quick enough to mask the hurt on his face.

“I’ll see you again, Caroline,” came his voice. And suddenly she was watching his retreating back. He walked slowly, like a human, winding his way through the trees without looking around.

The wind whipped up suddenly and she saw his shoulders hunch. The gust was pushing against her back, into the woods. After the vampire.

“Cut it out,” she snapped at no one in particular. It died, as suddenly as it had arrived, and Klaus was still walking. Caroline glanced around, frowning.

An experiment, she thought. Just an experiment.

She took a step into the woods.

Klaus didn’t turn, the collective darkness of the towering trees and thick clouds slowly swallowing his form, but a single drop of rain fell from the sky onto Caroline’s cheek. She glanced up.

“Seriously?”

She took another and the downpour began. Klaus was lost from view as the rain pelted down and Caroline shook her head, over and over, whether to dislodge droplets or to give the universe a piece of her mind, she wasn’t sure.

“No. Shut up. Shut up.”

She turned on her heel and ran back to her house. Vampire-ran. As though denying she had ever hovered at the edge of the trees.

She burst through the kitchen door just as her phone stopped ringing and cursed as she scraped damp hair from her face. A text buzzed from the table and she grabbed at the device, almost slipping on the tiles. Move quick, keep moving, keep doing, anything to feel like a part of her wasn’t back outside frozen in the rain.

_Klaus has Elena.  
 Bonnie and Jeremy are set.   
Plan is happening  
Stefan_

Outside, lighting tore the sky in a flash of frustration.


End file.
